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Poker2Nite - Season 2, Episode 10

You may love him, you may hate him, or you may feel sorry for him. But no matter what you think about him, it is undeniable that Mike “the Mouth” Matusow is never a dull interview, and he was the featured guest tonight on Poker2Nite, along with poker life coach Sam Chauhan, best known for assisting Antonio Esfandiari in his deep Main Event run in 2009. With Scott Huff, Joe Sebok and Dana Workman as hosts, here was this week’s episode.

The lead headline this week was the EPT Grand Final in Monte Carlo, which had 848 runners, and was won by Nicolas Chouity of Lebanon, who walked away with $2,278,328 for his victory. He was interviewed by Gloria Balding after the event, and came across as a very quiet, humble player, who was “just trying to play my best poker.” He went into the final table with the chip lead, and held on for the victory. With the attendance for the EPT final greatly eclipsing that of the WPT championship, does this mean that the EPT has now outstripped its rival in terms of prestige as well? When Sebok was asked this question, he suggested that he would rather have the WPT title, even though the cash is bigger on the EPT side. When David Williams won the WPT, he said it had long been a dream of his, and Sebok feels that this is not yet the case for the EPT. However, it is clear that there is a serious horse race for the number two spot behind the World Series as the most important event on the poker calendar.

Andrew Licthenberger, aka “lucky chewey,” won his first major title, taking down a WSOP-circuit event this week, pushing him over 1 million dollars in lifetime tournament earnings. Also noteworthy was Brock Parker’s 3rd place finish, as Parker also made the final table at Full Tilt Poker’s FTOPS Main Event this week, finishing sixth.

With the WSOP less than a month away, Sebok was asked what the best values are for players out of the 56 events. Sebok said that the first thing to take into consideration is how big your bankroll is. At the top of his list is any event that is a $1,000 buy-in no limit holdem event. He noted that this type of tourney is the very definition of “donkament,” and that first prize will be astronomical, because the field will be so large. For online players with a little more cash on hand, Sebok suggested the $5,000 no limit holdem 6-max event, saying that most live players rarely play less than a full ring tournament, and as a result, the online players who regularly sit in six-max tourneys will have a big advantage. Of course, Sebok also mentioned the Main Event, due to the huge number of ways to satellite into it, as well as the prestige associated with a deep run.

Tonight’s first in-studio guest was Mike Matusow, and he didn’t wait long before taking a controversial stance. The first question posed to him was whether he agreed with Ty Stewart of Harrah’s that this would be the year of the woman in the WSOP, especially given the recent run of success that women have had in major tournaments. Matusow said “That’s not a serious question, is it?” When the hosts pressed him on it, Matusow said that the women who have been victorious lately have been getting lucky and winning with miracle hands. Matusow put his own over-under on bracelets won by women at ½, as opposed to Stewart’s three, adding, “If three women win bracelets, I’ll run naked down the strip with a camera behind me.” Probably not a sight that many would care to see.

We learned that Matusow is now a coach with Deepstacks University, helping players improve their poker games. One of the main reasons he says he’s doing it is to get out of the house so he doesn’t wind up playing Internet poker, which seems to be the bane of his existence. Instead, people are paying good money to have Matusow abuse them, yell at them and throw chips at them. The school is all hands-on training, teaching both cash game and tournament play, and working on all aspects of the game. They will be doing a WSOP primer live event, and if, after taking the class, you make a final table of a WSOP tournament, you will get your buy-in back, and should you win a tourney, you’ll get a ticket to the WSOP Main Event. To end the interview, Matusow went “On The Clock” to try and answer more questions in 60 seconds than Trishelle Canatella, and he failed miserably, getting just three questions correct.

Sam Chauhan was the other guest this week, and after the success that Esfandiari had, and the credit he gave Chauhan for his new outlook, his client list is growing rapidly. He explained that it is not his job to teach any aspect of poker other than the player’s own mindset. He works by trying to build the player’s inner core, since if that is strong, it doesn’t matter what is happening externally to them in the world, they will be able to bounce back a lot better and faster. Ideally, the inner core of the player becomes so strong, that nothing affects them. He works with his players to make sure that they understand themselves well enough to feel a belief from the inside that they are truly good enough to win the event. He spoke about the fact that when things go wrong at the poker table, it is easy for a player to be flooded with negative thoughts. The successful player is the one who can get past that as quickly as possible and get re-centered. He explained two simple techniques to get the negative thoughts out of one’s mind. In one, you would hold your breath as long as you can; to get to the point where all the extraneous thoughts disappear and all you can think of is the need for breath. In another, you would wear a rubber band and, when negative thoughts creep in, snap the band hard, in order to block out all thoughts other than the pain in your wrist, in both instances, you allow the mind to reset in a more positive place.

All in all, it was an entertaining and informative half-hour. Let’s hope the last few shows of the season bring guests as interesting as this week’s episode. See you next week!